Explaining Phonics Instruction - An Educator's Guide LITERACY LEADERSHIP BRIEF - International Literacy Association
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LITERACY LEADERSHIP BRIEF Explaining Phonics Instruction An Educator’s Guide International Literacy Association | 2018
T
he relative weight of phonics instruction is one of the
most debated topics in education. Research estab
lishes that phonics is an essential part of instruction
in a total reading/language arts program.
Because phonics is often students’ first experience with
formal literacy instruction, families might be anxious about
their children’s learning. They may ask questions such as the
following:
• What method will teachers use to teach phonics?
• What phonics will my child learn this year?
• How can I assist my child at home?
• Is sounding out words the approach my child should use?
• Should I help my child memorize common words?
Educators will want to answer families’ questions and share
effective learning activities. As an educator, letting families
know that together you will make literacy interesting and
meaningful, and not a boring memorization task, is important.
Assure family members that by engaging with text at home,
their children have already learned a tremendous amount
about reading and writing, including many understandings
Let [families] know that the about print, letters, and letter sounds. Let them know that the
pace of instruction will vary pace of instruction will vary for individuals, and that not all
for individuals, and that not students are ready to learn the same skills at the same time.
all students are ready to Explain that teachers differentiate instruction to match stu
learn the same skills at the dents’ development.
same time. The information that follows summarizes some key points
from research that will help you to explain phonics to non
educators. You will find information about phonics for emerg
ing readers, phonological awareness, the layers of writing, word
study instruction, approaches to teaching phonics, and teach
ing English learners. The references include research that sup
ports the ideas presented and phonics resources that you can
use and share with others.
What Is Phonics?
Phonics is the study of the relationship between sounds and let
ters. It is an essential component of reading and writing prac
tice and instruction in the primary grades. Phonics knowledge
2leads to word knowledge. Along with plenty of experience read
ing, students begin to read words fluently with little effort.
Phonics instruction helps students to learn the written cor
respondences between letters, patterns of letters, and sounds.
It should be noted that phonics is one element of a comprehen
sive literacy program that must also include practice in com
prehension, fluency, vocabulary, writing, and thinking.
When Are Students Ready to Learn
Phonics?
There are several prerequisites to consider before involving
students in a formal phonics program. Language development
is the first consideration and includes an ability to recognize
and produce speech sounds, use language structures (syntax),
engage with meaning systems (semantics), and use language
Phonological awareness appropriately (pragmatics). Phonics works in concert with all
these language systems.
includes the ability to
Phonological awareness is a particularly important language
separate oral language into
skill to acquire before phonics instruction begins. Phonological
syllables and individual awareness includes the ability to separate oral language into
phonemes, the distinctive syllables and individual phonemes, the distinctive sounds for
sounds for the language the the language the student is learning to read (English has 44).
student is learning to read. Phonological awareness is learned through singing, tapping
syllables, rhyming, and dividing words into individual sounds.
When children are read to, and with explicit instruction at
home and school, they develop concepts of print that can be
expansive, such as learning the purposes of writing and il
lustrations; understanding what an author is; and identifying
text features including the front and back of a book, upper
case and lowercase letters, reading top to bottom, reading left
to write, return sweep at the end of a line, and the meaning of
punctuation.
After students have heard stories read to them repeatedly,
they try to point to the words as they recite their favorite mem
orized parts. Students develop a concept of word in text when
they point accurately to the words as they recite the text.
Concept of word in text develops in parallel with students’ pho
nics knowledge of letter–sound correspondences (e.g., learning
that the letter b makes the /b/ sound by repeatedly seeing b
words in a text).
3It is important for students to know the names of nearly
all the letters of the alphabet. Knowing the letter names is a
first step in phonics instruction and is associated with later
success in reading. The names of many letters correspond to
their sounds. When students understand that letters represent
sounds and have mastered several letter–sound correspon
dences, they have acquired the alphabetic principle. With this
principle, in tandem with concept of word in text in place, they
begin to finger-point read and remember written words.
How Phonics Is Taught
There are many ways to teach phonics, and there are similari
ties underlying the various methods used to teach letter–sound
Successful programs
relationships and word patterns. Successful programs or meth
or methods use explicit
ods use explicit phonics instruction that is systematic. They
phonics instruction that is also provide clear examples for students to build on as they
systematic. develop their awareness of the written code, of how words are
spelled.
English Orthography
English orthography is complex and may be confusing even to
some teachers. English is described as a deep writing system
with three layers:
1. The alphabetic layer, in which basic letter–sound correspon
dences are learned
2. The pattern layer, where students examine consonant–vowel
patterns (e.g., CVCe/cake, CVVC/nail, CVV/say)
3. The meaning and morphological layer, where students learn
new vocabulary and make generalizations about the meaning
structures of affixes (e.g., prefixes: un-, re- and suffixes: -ed,
-ful) and word roots (e.g., Greek: empathy, path, meaning suf-
fering or feeling and Latin: rebel, bel, meaning war)
Although readers always use and learn about phonics, stu
dents who have learned the first two layers for single-syllable
words have learned the fundamental of phonics. These stu
dents can read nearly all single-syllable words quickly and ac
curately. Most students acquire these fundamentals by the end
of the third grade.
4Analytic and Synthetic Approaches
Most phonics programs incorporate both analytic and synthetic
activities to teach the 26 letters of the alphabet and the 44 pho
nemes or distinctive sounds of English. In analytic instruction,
students compare words to identify patterns and apply this
knowledge to new words (e.g., ran/can), or they examine word
families to make analogies between segments of words (e.g., on
set and rime, r-an/c-an/f-an/m-an/p-an). In synthetic phonics,
Word study is an approach
students blend individual letter sounds together to form words
to teach the alphabetic (e.g., c-a-t/cat).
and pattern layers of the Word study is an approach to teach the alphabetic and pat
writing system by including tern layers of the writing system by including spelling instruc
spelling instruction that is tion that is differentiated by students’ development. There are
differentiated by students’ multisensory aspects of many phonics and word study activi
development. ties such as articulation in pronouncing the sounds, tracing
and writing letters, and tapping sounds in a word. The research
literature, however, does not indicate that a multisensory pro
gram is required for all students to learn phonics.
There is a similarity in the sequence of features taught in pho
nics programs. Most programs begin by teaching students the
letter–sound correspondences for consonants, short vowels,
and consonant digraphs (e.g., sh, th, wh) and blends (e.g., bl, st,
tr). To learn the second, more complex, pattern layer, students
learn to decode the orthographic patterns for long vowels and
complex vowels (e.g., ar, au, oi, ou, ow). The overlapping seam
between the pattern and the third layer, the meaning and mor
phological layer, is reached when students study homophones
(e.g., tail/tale) and homographs (e.g., read/read) and examine
the spelling of inflected endings (e.g., -ed in walked).
Phonics Instruction in Other Languages
Phonics is a part of learning to read in all languages. Students
who learn to read in multiple languages apply phonics that fit
the respective letter–sound, pattern, and meaning layers. There
is a wide variety in the balance of the three layers among writ
ing systems, including the way letters and characters represent
sounds. Phonics instruction always depends on the character
istics of a specific language.
For example, in shallow orthographies in which there are
highly predictable letter–sound correspondences, such as writ
ing in Spanish and Italian, the alphabetic layer applies across
5nearly all simple words, and this explains why the words are
easy to sound out, whereas in deep orthographies, such as
English and Chinese, there is a greater emphasis earlier on the
pattern or orthographic and meaning layers, and learners must
know the patterns to read many single-syllable words.
Emergent bilingual readers
and writers use what they Phonics Instruction With English Learners
know in one language to Emergent bilingual readers and writers use what they know
learn other languages. in one language to learn other languages. Given the variety of
languages among students, researching the characteristics
and phonics of students’ first languages and orthographies
and finding out about their reading and writing experiences in
their first languages is worthwhile.
There are distinct sounds and letters in other languages
that contrast or that may not exist in students’ first languages.
Students benefit from examining these cross-language differ
ences. Consider these three examples of contrasts between
English and Spanish:
1. /h/ sound in Spanish is silent (e.g., huevos/eggs)
2. The short o in English sounds like words spelled with an a in
Spanish (e.g., the a in gato [cat in Spanish], which sounds like
a short o)
3. The difference in how j is pronounced in Spanish (e.g., Juan,
jugo [juice]) compared with English (e.g., jump)
Teachers can help students contrast English with other lan
guages by consulting resources that explicate the differences
between English and other languages. These contrasts com
monly exist in the sounds of vowels and ending consonant
blends. Explicit phonics instruction with students learning
English helps them to learn unfamiliar sounds, pronunciations,
and their letter–sound correspondences.
6BIBLIOGRAPHY
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7ADDITIONAL RESOURCES
Bear, D.R., Invernizzi, M., Templeton, S., & Johnston, F. spelling instruction that emphasizes word study. The
(2016). Words their way: Word study for phonics, vo- Elementary School Journal, 95(2), 155–167.
cabulary, and spelling instruction (6th ed.). Boston, Joshi, R.M., Treiman, R., Carreker, S., & Moats, L.C.
MA: Pearson. (2008). How words cast their spell. American Educator,
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English-language learners. The Reading Teacher, Venezky, R.L. (1999). The American way of spelling: The
57(5), 452–460. structure and origins of American English orthogra-
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Using students’ invented spellings as a guide for
8International Literacy Association: Literacy Research Panel 2016–2017
Principal Author
Donald Bear, Iowa State University
Panel Chair
Diane Lapp, San Diego State University
Panel Members
Donna Alvermann, University of Georgia
Jim Anderson, University of British Columbia
Christine Garbe, University of Cologne, Germany
Gay Ivey, University of Wisconsin-Madison
Robert Jiménez, Peabody College, Vanderbilt University
Melanie Kuhn, Purdue University College of Education
Stuart McNaughton, University of Auckland, New Zealand
Heidi Anne E. Mesmer, Virginia Tech
Ernest Morrell, Teachers College, Columbia University
David Reinking, Clemson University
Deborah Rowe, Peabody College, Vanderbilt University
Misty Sailors, University of Texas at San Antonio
Sheila Valencia, University of Washington
Amy Wilson-Lopez, Utah State University
Jo Worthy, University of Texas, Austin
Douglas Fisher, San Diego State University, President and Board Liaison, International Literacy Association
William Teale, University of Illinois at Chicago, Immediate Past President, International Literacy Association
Marcie Craig Post, Executive Director, International Literacy Association
© 2018 International Literacy Association | No. 9433
This literacy leadership brief is available in PDF form for free download through the International Literacy Association’s website:
literacyworldwide.org/statements.
Media Contact: For all media inquiries, please contact press@reading.org.
Suggested APA Reference
International Literacy Association. (2018). Explaining phonics instruction: An educator’s guide [Literacy leadership brief]. Newark,
DE: Author.
About the International Literacy Association
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